[male narrator #2] Everywhere you turn, people try to tell you who to be and what to do, but what about deciding for yourself?

Roadtrip Nation is a movement that empowers people to define their own roads in life.

Every summer we bring together three people from different backgrounds.

Together they explore the country interviewing inspiring individuals from all walks of life.

They hit the road in search of wisdom and guidance to find what it actually takes to build a life around doing what you love.

This is what they found, This is Roadtrip Nation.

[roadtripper #2] Wait ok, what are we doing?

[roadtripper #3] Like a triple explosion.

I'm like fist bumps, and you go boom, and then finish it.

That's how we roll.

[roadtripper #1] Monday started out with a bang.

[roadtripper #3] We learned how to fly jetpacks.

Which is the first step in becoming a true superhero.

[roadtripper #2] I have no idea what to expect.

[leader #1] Ben, good to meet you.

Martha, good to meet you.

I really got lucky getting here.

Right place at the right time actually a friend of mine from college, she showed me a video, we went out to lunch after I had literally left my job with no plans other than to get away from the banking world.

She showed me this YouTube video of this guy walking on water and flying above it.

I said, "I don't know what that is but I like it."

And I liked the idea of scaring yourself just a little bit and figuring out how you can work through it and come out of it safely on the other side.

After fourteen years in the corporate world, I worked for a consulting firm in a big bank and realized that it wasn't the right place for me and I was confused by the people in college who knew from the moment they got to school what they wanted to be.

You do change as you grow up, so it's not going to be the same thing day one as it's going to be four years later or even ten years later.

You have to go out and experiment a little bit.

I'm about to fly a water jetpack.

[Ben] We're getting suited up.

All the Go Pros running.

I was so excited about it that I wasn't scared and then you strap up like a jet ski on you're back and you're like, this is a lot of power.

The learning of it is uncomfortable because it's new and you have that kind of like hesitancy.

[Dean] Right arm up, right arm up, right arm up.

[Martha] Feel like I'm going to get in there and feel like a fish trying to ride a bicycle.

[Ben] That was hard, it wasn't easy to be strapped into that.

You have to really remain calm.

[People speaking in background] [Sofaya] I don't do water.

I knew it wasn't going to be the height that got me, but the falling into water.

[backround: kick kick kick kick kick] [Sofaya] I almost drowned when i was a kid, it was a twelve foot pool and I hit the bottom.

[Instructor] Right now you're terrified but you're about to kill it.

I'm right here.

We're going to start off nice and slow, don't worry.

[Jet pack sounds] [Sofaya] That was the most terrifying experience, every time I went under I became less and less ok. [Sofaya] I can't do this.

I think I'm done.

[Martha] That took guts man.

[Sofaya] I was just like, I'm not going back in there.

Let's not, I'm going to go back on the boat and watch.

[Dean] If something doesn't feel right, don't pretend like it is.

It's always going to be that learning experience, it's better to jump in and say hmm that was a learning experience, not going to do that again.

Rather than say hmm I wonder if that's something I should have done.

So you're going to get out there.

I'm sure there are certain things putting you out of your comfort zone.

Your personal growth comes from that extension of yourself.

[Ben] That was unlike anything I've ever done.

That was incredible.

I got the itch you know?

When you're presented an opportunity, you get that nervous feeling.

You just have to have that openness to experience, to put yourself out there no matter what.

[Martha] It's definitley an exercise in learning to be present.

It wasn't a natural instinct.

It kind of became this zen moment.

It's pretty powerful.

[Sofaya] I kind of always force myself to do these things.

Because I never know when I'm going to be ok and when I'm not.

It's just better to be on the other side of a yes than to be on the other side of having said no and having nothing.

[Dean] Stop dreaming, start flying.

From Dean the Jetpack Guy.

[Ben] I got an email now saying congratulations, you're a jetpack pilot.

So I'm going to save that email forever.

Just kind of add that on the resume.

Jet pack pilot, part time, on the side.

Just in case.

[Sofaya] So me, Martha, and Ben all happen to be kind of east coast people, like northeast.

I've never been west of the Missippissi River before.

[Ben] Everything is new to me.

I mean out of all the places we're going to this summer, Chicago and New York are the only ones I've been to.

The west coast is just like this unknown enticing idea I have yet to explore.

♪ [Martha] We're starting on the west coast doing a big loop de doop.

We're talking to inspirational people that design.

We come from really different backgrounds in terms of why design is important to us and I see it in more of a social, cultural context.

Sofaya sees it in this very applied context because she's coming from RISD and has so many intimidating practical skills around design.

And Ben is kind of coming from a communication marketing like how does that work kind of stand point.

So I'm really excited to see the breadth of people we're going to be able to talk to just based on all our different interests.

[Ben] Does anybody else want a marshmallow?

[Martha] When I was a kid I had the dream of starting like a smores stand.

[Ben] Yeah?

[Martha] Where you just sell every kind of epic smore, you do like gummy bear smores, and M&M smores and smores with oreos like and fudge like hot melted, yeah.

[Martha] That sounds kind of gross.

[Ben] Ugh, this is like right off the bat.

Peanut butter, cookie butter, and cinnamon sugar.

Alright chef Ben here, I'm in the peanut kitchen.

We got all of our ingredients here to make peanut butter smores, and what you need, some quality graham crackers.

Little stale, they're going to do the trick.

It's alright, we make do with what we have here on the RV.

Mmm beautiful.

Quick stir on the peanut butter.

Nice big glob there, make sure you're not dripping all over the place, Mom's going to get mad.

And here we go.

Just a nice coating like that.

You want to make sure it's uneven.

if you have too much evenness in peanut butter, then you're investing too much time into it.

Obviously we got a plethora of chocolate here, but we're going to go with the standard two bar break and if you're a Hershey's lover then you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Boom, right in the peanut butter.

Mmm starting to come together now.

Here we go.

I'm going to be so sick after this one.

[Ben] Yeah, so Wednesday morning we woke up on a side street in the film district of LA where all the big studios are.

Took the old Nalgene water bottle shower in the morning and feeling spritely.

We're going straight into multiple interviews in LA.

We're going to meet with Christian Troy from Waves For Water.

Laney Gradus from Frame Store, and Wayne from Disney Animation, the designer behind Elsa from Frozen, the princess, which is so cool.

[Troy] I've had a lot of different types of work, it's always with something I'm really excited to do.

It's turned into what I'm doing now.

Waves For Water is a Humanitarian aide organization with a very simple focus, to get clean water to people.

One thing I always think about when people are not sure, whether at this stage, or even buddies that are at my age now, is to stay on it, stay dynamic.

All my life's stuff to this point, whatever the different stages were, I did what I wanted to be doing at that phase.

I was acting out of my heart, but I didn't always design it.

It would pop up, I feel how much I would draw upon all the things I have done from childhood that are culminating in this work.

Ultimately it has turned into what I'm doing now.

[Sofaya] I studied industrial design but I never really found something that I can call my identity as a designer and I'm just standing at the intersection wondering where I'm supposed to go.

[Laney] We say we want to go we got to know we got to know, well sometimes you don't know, you just don't know.

That's got to be ok, that's got to be ok. And I know what that angst is like guys, I've had that angst most of my life.

And it's not going to happen in the time you want it, It's not going to happen, you can't write the script exactly like you want it.

Don't beat yourself up if you're in the middle of the road, if you're at the crossroads.

You know, you don't know what's ahead and that's a really great thing.

[Sofaya] Laney is no nonsense, she is a go getter.

In a way that I hope that I am, In a way that I hope I will be.

I hope to keep in contact with her.

And she specifically said keep in contact with people, keep in contact with me and I was like, "Ok you gave me homework, I'm going to turn it in."

[Martha] Hi there I'm Martha.

[Wayne] I would be working with my dad doing construction during the day, then at night I would be putting together my reel, animating it.

'Cause you know you have to work hard, you have to have a good work ethic.

I believed in myself that I can get there.

We're creating something that's bigger than any of us and that's, it's so much fun.

[Martha] I love that the interviews become about careers but also about just like what you value in life.

The more I talk to people, the more I realize that there are a lot of people who are trying to make that connection.

[Laney] I've done things that i really didn't want and I knew that this is not quite a fit for me.

And I kept doing it and I kept doing it and the more I kept trying to do it, kind of the worse I was at it.

Because I was fighting against my instinct and I got over it, but I knew I didn't have to do it again.

It's really simple and we just complicate it.

Don't be afraid.

[Wayne] Sometimes a job is stressful but you find there's a reason why you're doing what you're doing.

When you make something and you can see a reaction from the audience.

To make them cry, to make them laugh, it's the best feeling in the world.

And that was a good motivation to get through, you know all those times of, "Ah it's really late, I've got to do overtime for this," but it's worth it.

["Let it Go" from Frozen] [Ben] He would work all day, and then go home at night and study and learn on his own and build his portfolio until it was good enough.

He had to create the structure, he had to create the material, and it worked for him.

[Sofaya] Nice, do good things.

[Troy] I stuck by the things that I wanted to be doing and developed skills around that and then a circumstance would appear and I was prepared for it.

There is absolutely a place for all the things you guys do and things you love to do.

You just have to see the world to know where you plug it in.

[Martha] The more we've been interviewing you realize people's personalities pretty quickly and they were just so in love with what they did.

I am always feeling this tension between like there are only so many hours in the day and people who spend 20 hours a day like doing web design are obviously going to be better at it than I am.

So it's like maybe I want to be an artist, or do I want to be radio or documentary, but the world doesn't necessarily work that way.

[Ben] Ok thanks so much Adam.

Alright have a great day.

Bye.

Perfect.

[Sofaya] Remind me who that was again.

[Ben] We're going to be meeting with a sports wear designer for Patagonia, John Rapp.

We're actually going to Patagonia.

We're leaving LA to drive North to Ventura.

So long.

I had it the other day.

[Engine Sounds] [Ben] Left [Sofaya] Right now?

[Ben] Whenever (laughs) [Martha] Whenever, just whenever.

Patagonia definitely has a reputation that precedes it.

Straighten out, I think we got it!

[Martha] Once I got there, it was clearly such an intentional community.

Like they offered us breakfast, lunch, a yoga class and a hot shower and we were just like, "Thank you!"

[Martha] Even for just being here for twenty minutes there was such a unique culture here at Patagonia, like what about this drew you to this job?

I just feel lucky my personal goals and philosophies paralleled that of the organization.

I think that's kind of the dream and that's why I've been here a decade and a half.

That's the whole thing.

Just finding what works for you and getting after it.

[Martha] I mean I guess just to start out, we'd love to hear about what you were feeling when you were our age.

[John] Absolutely.

So I grew up just up the street in Santa Barbara and I've always been building things and I love making things with my hands.

Basically breaking them, fixing them, and improving them and that's always been a big passion.

I went to school in Flagstaff, Arizona for undergrad.

I studied business marketing.

I was teaching skiing and came up with a little idea for skiing, a little product.

[Martha] What was that first thing?

[John] It was padding for ski racing.

And I met some folks that turned me onto industrial design and then I was like, "Wow," it totally clicked.

Gosh people are making a living doing this and much more interesting to me than taking my one little idea and seeing it through and starting a business was the ideation and the conceptualization in the kind of the product design of making this.

So I learned a ton about materials and that there are people that actually do that full time and after school I went to design sneakers at New Balance just north of Boston.

[Ben] What was it like when you worked in Boston?

[John] Boston was interesting because they have a, and you guys are, a lot of you are tuned into that part of the world, to my observation they were far more interested in academics and they were much more driven than we are on the west coast.

I mean they worked.

You know what I mean, we would go for a little bit of soccer after work at five and I was like ok and they would be like, we're going back.

Like all of us, we're all going back to the studio to work and they would put in their time.

I would just shut down and be like looking for my pencil that was behind my ear and I was just so tired and so not giving good energy at that point but I don't think it's a race at all.

You know, each day I think you should get out and milk that day personally as well as professionally so I'm not a believer in working really late and being consumed with work outside the building and tons of people do it out on the west coast too, tons of people, but I'm a pretty firm believer in pacing and finding something that you love and digging in for the long haul.

I hope I can work for decades more.

[Martha] I wonder too sometimes if we're all east coasters, is it too engrained in us at this point?

[Sofaya] Yeah is it too late?

[Martha] Is it too late?

[John] No, it's not even close to too late.

[Sofaya] Like I was coming here and I was like you guys have yoga at lunch time, you can just come in here and then go back to work like.. [Martha] Sounds awesome.

[Sofaya] Even if it's something that doesn't end up being me, it's like having the experience of knowing what that lifestyle is like in a productive environment.

Something that's very intriguing to me.

[John] you can create that, that's a really important part of it too is creating it for yourself.

It takes a lot along the way to find a really good fit, and then once you do it still requires a lot of maintenance like any relationship to keep it healthy because it's only as good as what you bring to it.

So if I'm doing too much work, that's not balanced.

If I'm letting work fall behind a little bit, that's not, that doesn't work so you're always tweaking the dials.

Nature has got that figured out perfectly.

That's kind of the ultimate role model I think of how something can work and that's just like the phase of life you guys are in.

I think if we just emulate nature, nature will go one direction if it's just not working, just turn a little bit.

Start pursuing something and if it's a fit, keep at it, and if it's not don't shackle yourselves.

[Ben] John's analogy of having the dials balance really resonates with me and that the best work is going to come if we can make everybody's dials as balanced as possible.

[John] I'm inspired by you guys.

I really appreicate it.

Thanks.

You are going to affect a lot of people on the road.

[Ben] He was like go discover your dials, go discover what those are.

And then once you realize what makes you happy.

If you're somebody like Wayne, who really was passionate about his craft.

Then you crank that dial up and you run with it man.

You get really good at that.

He's spending all day and all night building his work skills so he can keep fulfilling that dream that he's discovered.

We feel like we're in an unnatural point where we're like oh my gosh what am I supposed to do with my life.

Coming on the RV and traveling around the country is about that self-discovery process of where do my dials need to be.

Just being on the road this summer, I don't know if I'm going to find that one thing, but I know for sure that I will gather a whole heap of things that will help me discover what my dials are, how to tweak them, how to refine that place where I want my life to go.

♪ [Sofaya] This next week is going to be just whistles stops, just non-stop like go here go there and then this and then that.

Like if you ask me to write everything down, everything that's going to happen for the next seven days, I wouldn't.

I would just be like stuff, driving.

and then yeah.

I'm going to be experiencing things that are so different than what I'm used to.

I'm just going to jump in, just going to do it do it do it.

[Martha] We're about a week and two days at this point into this trip.

It already feels like six weeks.

So we're going to talk to Glynn Washington, the radio host of Snap Judgement.

[Glynn] When we get into a foreign environment, it essentially just reduces us to an infantile status.

You take in the world in a whole different way.

[leader #4] I was sitting on the curb one day and I went "How the heck do they make these?"

and it didn't take more than a fraction of a second for me to go in the garage and start taking it apart.

[Music fades out] [female narrator #4] Roadtrip Nation extends beyond the program you just watched It's a movement that empowers people to define their own roads in life Here's a quick snapshot of "Road to Teach," An education themed roadtrip.

[roadtripper #4] Oh my god.

It's real!

It's happening!

It's like a postcard.

[roadtripper #5] That's so awesome.

[Nadia] This summer I'm embarking on an adventure.

[Rafael] I'm going to be traveling with two strangers across the United States from coast to coast.

[Grace] We're going to be interviewing all different people who are involved in education.

[Nadia] All types of minds.

Like scientific minds, and creative minds.

And everybody will have something important to add to the puzzle.

[Rahm] You're thinking about giving something to other people.

You will learn more about Nadia, Grace, and Rafi doing something for somebody else.

[Melissa] It's just one right step at a time to build a beautiful career and a life work.

[Omoju] Just take a deep breath.

Just tell your feet to move and your feet will move.

[Grace] I feel like completely new situations give you kind of a blank canvas [Nadia] We can really do something about this.

And it is our generation, like, we're going to be those leaders who will really make a difference on how education gonna morph in the future.

[Rafael] These people have changed my outlook.

Profoundly, and that surprised me.

I didn't really expect these interviews to be quite so impactful.

No matter what you do or where you come from you've got wisdom to pass down.

[male narrator #1] Help young people find their way by sharing the lessons you've learned.

Take 15 minutes to tell us what you love to do.

The doors open we're all ears become a leader at shareyourroad.com